This question pertains to one of the main themes is my dissertation-in-progress ("Minamata: Power, Policy, and Citizenship in Postwar Japan"). I ask why the 1959 "settlement" of the Minamata incident ("solatium" payments to victims by the company, with no acceptance of responsibility; installation of equipment supposed to eliminate mercury from the waste; the supposed end of the disease) did not hold, and why the second round (mid-60s to mid-70s, including the successful first suit against the company in the context of the rise of citizens' groups, the belated government finding that the company's waste was the cause, the "Pollution Diet" of 1970, etc.) went so differently from the first.

My answers are of two types. First are the larger changes occurring from the mid-50s to the mid- and late 60s: high growth itself, Anpo and Beheiren and the New Left, citizens' groups, the increased number of lawsuits over traffic accidents, other pollution incidents elsewhere in Japan and the world, etc. Second are the fascinating, creative individuals who I think pushed things in new directions: local author Ishimure Michiko, concerned scientist Ui Jun, the leader of the "direct negotiations" faction Kawamoto Teruo, et al.

The question I have to answer is this: to what extent would circumstances have required the emergence of other people to play the same roles if these particular individuals had not done so, and to what extent did these people change the course of history in ways no one else could? An old question for historians of course.

Any suggestions as to ways to deal with this?

Yoroshiku,
Timothy S. George (george1[atx]husc.harvard.edu)